UFC 190: What happened when Ronda Rousey clashed with Bethe Correira?
The UFC 190 card from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in August 2015 was stacked with a mammoth seven fights on the main card due to the Brazilian Ultimate Fighter finals being moved to this show following their cancellation at the previous Fight Night show in Brazil in June that year.
The headline attraction was the Bantamweight title defence between champion, Ronda Rousey, who was now firmly entrenched as a mainstream celebrity as she took on unbeaten Brazilian, Bethe Correira.
It is easy to see why UFC booked native Correira versus Rousey. However, they shouldn't have. This was a massive mismatch as Rousey exploded out of the blocks punching Correira at will until "Big John" McCarthy hauled her off the shell-shocked Brazilian. Your winner after just 34 seconds: Ronda Rousey.
Rousey dedicated her win to "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, the WWE Hall of Famer who years earlier had endorsed Rousey to use his "Rowdy" nickname after he had passed away the previous day.
The co-main event was a rematch of a classic bout from Pride FC. It was the battle of the Brazilians as Mauricio "Shogun" Rua clashed with "Little Nog", Antonio Rogerio Nogueria.
The result was the same as the Pride bout, but not even half as good. With an extra 10 years on the clock, both men had slowed massively and spent 15 minutes exchanging leg kicks and not much else. "Shogun" was the more aggressive and so earned the Decision win, as he had a decade ago.
The Ultimate Fighter finals were also disappointing affairs.
In the Lightweight final, Glaico França defeated Fernando Bruno via Decision but the contest was a snooze fest. Franca's massive frame made it awkward for Bruno to enact his solid grappling game.
He gassed and that allowed Franca to lock in the choke for the submission win. A clash of styles but not a pretty one and it is no surprise that neither man has gone on to great things in MMA.
In the Bantamweight final, Reginaldo Vieira defeated Dileno Lopes via Unanimous Decision. The only interesting thing about this fight is the ridiculous judge's decision to award the bout to Vieira.
Lopes was the top prospect on the Ultimate Fighter and was the favourite to win. Lopes began the fight with some big uppercuts that hit their mark and the pair traded some nice blows before another great shot from Lopes hurt Vieira.
Viera was busted open badly as Lopes tried to engineer the win. He locked in the guillotine tight but somehow Vieira survived.
In his guard, Lopes nailed his opponent with some huge elbows and Vieira responded with hammer fists until the fight ended at the 15-minute mark before the nonsense decision.
In what turned out to be the final match of the legendary Heavyweight, Antonio "Rodrigo" Nogueira, saw him engage in a battle with Stefan Struve.
Nogueira looked every bit his 39 years as he struggled to move around the Octagon and absorbed blow after blow from Struve.
The "Skyscraper's" reach was so massive that "Big Nog" could not close the distance and demonstrated no willingness to take the battle down to the canvas due to his knackered knees.
It was not a pretty sight to witness and Struve took a comfortable Unanimous Decision.
In another Heavyweight contest, "Bigfoot" Silva squashed Soa Palelei in the second round of their battle of the behemoths encounter. Huge uppercuts did for Palelei who crumpled to the mat in an undignified heap.
"Bigfoot" with that KO saved his UFC career with his first win in over two years.
The card opened with another female bout. The Strawweight encounter between Claudia Gadelha and Jessica Aguilar promised much on paper as both fighters had great striking ability.
Gadelha impressed, using her superior speed to consistently beat Aguilar to the punch with faster hands and also chucked Aguilar all over the Octagon with some excellent takedowns. It was no surprise to see the judge's favour her in the scoring.
UFC 190 was a stacked card that promised much but underwhelmed. The headliner was a mismatch and the Heavyweight matches on the show were mainly lumbering, plodding affairs.
At least the event was a financial success. The card pulled a phenomenal 900,000 pay per view orders; one of the best numbers in company history.